It’s long been said that the world is going digital, but not everyone wants an online experience all of the time.
While in the modern age, insurance companies should give their clients the ability to self-manage their policies, there is still an appetite for doing business offline,
Markerstudy’s group commercial director Martyn Holman told Insurance Business.
“There are still some people out there who don’t want that, and I think that’s the challenge at the moment around personal lines broking,” Holman commented in an interview.
“If you are to give every client exactly what they want, you have to have a diverse offering, because there are actually a number of people who don’t want to do everything online, they want to pick up the phone and speak to you.”
And it’s not simply a case of certain clients being completely tech-phobic – in many cases, customers are happy to do certain services online but not others, Holman explained.
“We’ve found that certainly in some of the SME classes, for example, that although people are happy to maybe buy a commercial vehicle policy online, they’re not as happy to buy a PI [professional indemnity] policy online.”
Some players in the market who set out to be entirely digital have ended up having to set up call centres to deal with customer demand, he said. “Because the reality is, if you don’t, then you lose all of those potential customers. So again, it’s about being able to have a diverse service offering whereby you can cater for the clients’ needs.”
Admitting that personal lines broking has its challenges, due in part to regulation as well as the effect of digital and direct, Holman said that the industry is now forced to be “smarter and quicker and more agile,” than it used to be.
Markerstudy’s focus is on honing in on the areas in which it can provide a service to customers that they need and want, as well as being able to do it and turn a profit, he said. “Because the reality is if we can’t turn a profit, then like anybody else why would you do it.”
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